Gallery EXIT is pleased to present First, then and after, a group exhibition curated by Ying KWOK, featuring CHING Chin Wai, KONG Chun Hei, Sarah LAI, Lewis LAU, LAW Man Lok, Gabriel LEUNG, Otto LI, Annie WAN, Cam WONG and Morgan WONG.

Artworks featured in First, then and after are each, registered by various artists, an interpretation about the concept of time and space in response to one image – a knot. The curatorial direction designed for this exhibition invites new perspective. It engenders an alternative communication beyond language through one single image of a knot in simple composition. On the quotidian level, the use of knots is much embedded in the deep of our everyday experience that the act of knotting – the sequence and movements – has mostly escaped consciousness and attention. Almost an indefinite, open-ended symbol given by the curator, the ten artists respond to the image of knot with their own works.

Lewis LAU’s painting on an empty playground explores the notion of time in terms of memory.Gabriel LEUNG sees time as a witness of tension between human civilization and nature. Sarah LAI is interested in our higher engagement in virtual experience on the Internet than actual participation in reality. Otto LI dismantles experiences through digital tools and reconstructs them into unfamiliar sculpture. Annie WAN’s ceramic work is the fossil of past memory and experience where the original object vanishes in the making process, leaving traits of familiar images in a state of foreignness.

Luke CHING’s drawings visualise objects through personal memory and knowledge.LAW Man Lok’s paintings emphasize on the synergy of imagination and criticality. Morgan WONG continues his long-term interest in materialising the ephemeral and in exploring the subject of lifespan. Repeated printing and polishing until all the traces disappear, Cam WONG’s works are an elongated time record. KONG Chun Hei’s drawings embody the passage of time. Every stroke marks a moment in time.